


Like knights in shining armor

by PuzzlesolverDramaqueen



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies), Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Legilimency, M/M, Queenie is a good person, Tragedy, and Dumbledore's hurting a lot, and this is not a fairy-tale, maybe a bit cliché, people are easiest to read when they are hurting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-26
Updated: 2017-03-26
Packaged: 2018-10-10 17:48:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10443573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PuzzlesolverDramaqueen/pseuds/PuzzlesolverDramaqueen
Summary: This is their fairy-tale gone bad and it has only one witness. - Dumbledore isn't  all that mysterious to Queenie.





	

Queenie did not do it on purpose. It just happened to her. She looked into other people's heads the same way she looked around in a new room. It was a reflex, taking in new information that was on plain sight for her.

Admittedly, Brits were a bit harder, because of the accent and she could imagine that Professor Dumbledore was gifted at occlumency, but he was just hurting _so_ much, talking to Newt and Tina in the back of that small hotel room.

She couldn't hear, what they were saying, but she knew it was about Grindelwald and Credence and whatever it was, that was going on in Paris.

She didn't even know, how they'd got to Paris in the first place. Not that she didn't like it. Paris was beautiful, so European, so artistic, so romantic, but she'd have rather been here under different circumstances.

Newt said something and a whole string of pictures flashed through Professor Dumbledore's mind, like a scrapbook in front of her eyes.

She could see two boys laughing together in a golden summer; the same boys kissing, their clothes dripping wet in a pond. She could see them snuggled together in a bed that was far too small for them and heat radiating between them, out of breath kisses and moans and 'I love you's and fingers entwining on a pillow. (She tried not to look too closely at that.)

She could see a young girl and an angry young boy and a fight and flashes of light and then a tombstone. She could almost feel the pain herself, almost flinched, because it was so overwhelming, but Professor Dumbledore's face betrayed nothing of this.

She wasn't shocked by what she saw, she rarely was - she looked into other people's minds so often, saw so many things, that love and heartbreak were probably among the most common thoughts she witnessed.

She could hear him telling himself to stay away from these memories, but it didn't work very well.

"Are you okay?" Jacob asked curiously.

She turned to him, smiling and Professor Dumbledore's thoughts disappeared. "Yes", she replied, a bit clipped. Jacob nodded and they stood in silence for a moment, until she looked him in the eyes. "Actually", she began, grabbed his arm and pulled him over to the couch at the other end of the room. He looked at her, only mildly surprised.

For a No-Maj he had gotten used to the magical world and its inhabitants and their antics quite quickly.

"What do you see?", he asked and that almost surprised her, because she was so used to knowing other people's thoughts but not to other people knowing her.

"He knows Grindelwald", she whispered.

Jacob's brows furrowed. "Yeah, I thought all the wizards know him."

"Not like that. He knows him from a long time ago."

"Wait. Is this about people being easy to read, when they're in pain? Because I thought he was this great mysterious wizard." Now he did look mildly confused.

"Yes." Queenie nodded, looking over to Professor Dumbledore again. 

_Obscurials. Muggle boys. The Greater Good. Crucio. I love you. I hate you. Hallows. Fawkes. I still love you. War. Nazis. I can't... I have to. Ariana. Credence._

"They were... friends. When they were young", she clarified slowly.

"I thought he was the good guy." Jacob subtly pointed to Dumbledore, but from the look Tina shot them over Dumbledore's shoulder, she had picked up on it.

"He is", she said. "He's suffering."

Jacob's eyes travelled from Queenie to Dumbledore and back. "I'm confused."

"Oh, I'm sorry." She smiled at him and squeezed his hand. "Can you keep a secret?"

Jacob raised an eyebrow, amused. "What do you think?"

Queenie leaned in a bit. "They were lovers... once upon a time", she whispered.

 

*

 

_"Will you go with me?", Grindelwald asked seriously, his eyes fixed on the other boy's._

_Dumbledore smiled, put a hand on his cheek and kissed him tenderly, leaning his forehead against Grindelwald's._

_"To the end of the world, if you want me to", he whispered solemnly._

_Grindelwald smiled. "To the continent should be enough for now.”_

 

This time Professor Dumbledore looked at her. She smiled guiltily, but he only smiled back and came over to where she stood near the mooncalves' rocks.

"I'm sorry, I can't help it", she said.

"No need to apologies." He outstretched a hand to stroke a mooncalf that had obviously had enough of the food that Jacob offered them in the distance.

"You have never stopped loving him."

Dumbledore sighed, looking exhausted all of a sudden.

"No. I suppose I have not."

Sympathetically she put a hand on his arm. "I'm sorry."

"There is a difference between loving a person and loving the memory of a person. And I fear Gellert isn't the boy I knew anymore... if I ever knew him." He shook his head, as if to get rid of a nasty thought.

 

_"We will be great, Albus", Grindelwald assured, pushing a wayward strand behind Dumbledore's ear. "We will create a better world."_

_"You make us sound like knights from a fairy-tale", Dumbledore snorted._

_Grindelwald smiled mischievously. "We are! And the world is our Damsel in distress. They will love us!"_

_Dumbledore laughed. "I will always love you more."_

 

*

 

"You haven't told Newt", Dumbledore said, when they met again a few years later in Hogsmeade. Newt was the one to visit, seeking to discuss his studies about Obscurials, while Dumbledore wanted to introduce him to Rubeus Hagrid. But, of course, Newt had brought Tina along and Tina had asked her to come as well. "About me and Gellert."

Queenie nodded. "It's not my story to tell." She looked him in the eyes and she could see glimpses of feelings. _Gratitude. Hurt, still. Love, still. Turmoil. Fear._ But she couldn't see memories anymore. No more clear thoughts.

She had to admit, she was surprised, never having met anyone who could shut her out this well before, but then again, he was rumored to be one of the most talented wizards of their time. 

Dumbledore smiled and this time, their roles seemed reversed. "It is nothing personal, but I prefer to keep my thoughts to myself."

"Oh, it's okay. It's impressive." 

They looked out over the wide Scottish highlands, seemingly calm, untouched by the war - wizarding and muggle alike - raging around them.

"Although... I have told Jacob", she admitted after a while.

"Of course", Dumbledore smiled.

"He won't tell anyone."

"I appreciate that."

"You know, if you fight him, that will be for the Greater Good, right? A real greater good."

Dumbledore sighed. "It was me, who gave him those words, once upon a time."

"I know", she said. "But this was not what you meant, was it?"

"Sometimes I am not so sure, what I meant, to be honest."

 

*

 

She was in America, when the duel happened, but as soon as she heared about it, she sent an owl to Tina in england, asking, if she could visit.

Newt was rather famous, too, those days and many of the press conferences he was forced to attend as well.

She was happy to see her sister and nieces and nephews again and whole england seemed to be in a good mood, but when she met Newt, she couldn't help but notice how nervous he was.

The press and public weren't his domain and fame even less so, but he could manage it.

Dumbledore was a whole different story, though. At the press conference she witnessed, he seemed calm and collected, smiling politely. But - to her astonishment - she could read his mind again.

She saw flashes of the duel, curses, hexes, a wand - Elderwand - mixing with the duel she had once seen in his mind years ago.

 

_Grindelwald kneeled on the hard ground in front of him, destruction around them and a defeated silence._

_Dumbledore stared down at him, a wand in each hand, exhausted - physically as much as emotionally._

_"Funny, isn't it?", Grindelwald said with a dark chuckle. "Now you are, what I wanted to be. What we wanted to be together."_

_Dumbledore couldn't talk, he just kept staring at the man in front of him._

_"The white knight in shining armor." Grindelwald grinned up at him mirthlessly, eyes blank. "This is our fairy-tale, Albus." He outstretched his arms and pointed at the destroyed plaza around them._

 

Queenie could feel the painful sting again that had to be so much worse for Dumbledore himself.

_Not Azkaban. I can't do that to him. Not dementors. Not like father. Nurmengard. Nurmengard will hold him. Not Azkaban._

His face betrayed nothing of that, not even when the reporters disappeared and he and Newt could leave the stage with Leonard Spencer-Moon.

"Mrs. Kowalski", Dumbledore smiled.

"Hello, Professor Dumbledore", she replied and to his obvious surprise, she stepped forward and hugged him. "I'm sorry", she whispered in his ear, while he patted her back hesitantly.


End file.
